Recently reading Traveling With Pomegranates: A Mother-Daughter Story by Sue Monk Kidd and Ann Kidd Taylor, I was struck by a passage in which Sue Monk Kidd describes an unusual painting depicting the Madonna and Child:

“Once in an art gallery, I came upon a painting of the Madonna holding her toddler in one arm and an open book in her opposite hand. Her eyes are turned toward her child as if she has just been torn from her reading. Heavily lidded, they exude a look of sweet adoring, but they also carry a wistful expression, the sigh of interruption, the veiled craving for her book pages. It was like observing a conflict at the hub of my existence. Baby or book. Children or writing. Motherhood or career.” (p. 16)

Countless times, I have found myself in the position of the Madonna, literally holding my baby in one arm and a book in the other. And just as often, I have felt the implicit guilt that Kidd describes, being torn between my intellectual wants and the real-time needs of the baby, even selfishly torn between desire and obligation.

I had to find this painting for myself.

Called “Virgin and Child in a Landscape,” it is a fascinating piece of art. It captures in totality the balance issues that are at the heart of the working mother: The balance between book and baby, career and child, as well as the necessity of managing both at the same time instead of setting one down in favor of another, or even choosing one over the other. It’s also interesting how the child has his hand on his mother’s book, perhaps representing the overlap between child and career, between family and work.

It’s also remarkable that this painting dates to the late 1400s, indicating that women may have been dealing with balance issues for more than 600 years.

Perhaps I am drawn to this painting so much because it assuages some of my guilt. After all, even the Madonna herself has struggled with this dilemma. And with Mother and Child located in a landscape that balances and blends natural elements and built structures, the painting also conveys hope of a pastoral balance of all things, including work and family. Perhaps it is even the existence of all of these things in tandem that can lead to the ultimate harmony.

As working mothers, we can only hope so.

Has anyone else out there felt this literal pull between baby and book?

“Virgin and Child in a Landscape” is currently on display at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. http://www.artsconnected.org/resource/1100/virgin-and-child-in-a-landscape